Netgear ReadyNAS Duo v2 (RND2110-200NAS)

*** Unlike so many previous Amazon reviewers, compared to whom I am a child, I will speak to the less sophisticated potential user of the Netgear ReadyNAS Duo v2 (2TB: 2 X 1TB) (RND2210), of which I am definitely one. I chose this product to use as an external drive where I could store backups of the hard drive on my desktop computer. And for that purpose it should do a terrific job, and maybe it does, but the point is that I don't know, which is why I subtract two stars from five. I have struggled for an unreasonably long time trying to figure out how to use this device for that simple task. The Duo v2 is designed to perform other, more sophisticated functions such as hosting a website or acting as a virtual cloud, and how to use this device for those purposes is so far beyond my knowledge that it's like Einstein compared to someone who is, like, really not like Einstein. I am a child. Still, what I did expect it to do, which is merely act as another drive with its own drive letter such as R:, is something I imagine lots of people would expect. The necessary help information on how to perform such a simple, unsophisticated task, is missing. The entirety of the printed instructions accompanying the product says the following: (1) Connect the device to power, then (2) connect the device to a computer. For any other information you must rely on the help screens. I have been around and around, and around, those help screens. I mean I've really borne down and tried hard to make sense of how to use this product for what I want, with no success. So I went to the NAS website and wandered around and around, and around, there for quite a little bit, by which I mean quite a lot indeed. No matter what I read or tried, it didn't work or didn't make sense. So I went to the support forum for the Netgear ReadyNAS Duo v2 (2TB: 2 X 1TB) (RND2210), where I was sure other owners as unsophisticated as me would have asked and gotten good answers to questions as simple as mine. I looked around and around, and around, and I did not find any such answers. I even went so far as to join the forum so I could ask my questions, and the response I got merely led me to the website's instructions, which, as I believe I've already made clear, either did not work for me or made no sense to me. Now I understand that a large percentage of the typical users of this product already knew more about it before they acquired it than I do now, after all these hours trying to figure it out. But I still expected SOME useful information for babies. *** As is my wont, I tested this product in a few ways that might seem to some to be unnecessary, but, as I say, that is my wont, which I admit I don't know exactly how to pronounce. First, it is not a good bathtub toy. It sinks to the bottom of the tub almost immediately. It does emit some bubbles but then that's pretty much it as far as fun goes. Also, at this point it stops working as any sort of NAS. (Or as a flashlight; see below.) Second, it is a poor substitute for a flashlight. There are four LEDs on the front panel (one of which flashes every so often for some reason) but taken together they emit very little light, and you'd be way better off lighting a match, which would not rely on how long a power cord is. Last, it is an admirable paperweight in the sense that it has really grippy feet and is surprisingly heavy for its size. At 8.7 inches deep by 5.6 inches tall by 4 inches wide that's 194.88 cubic inches. At 9.4 pounds, that's 0.048234811 pounds per cubic inch, which compared to your standard Nerf ball is 2,345,821 times denser, which is a lot if you think you can casually lift this unit with one hand, which you can't. Heck, it's 2 terabytes, which is just over 469,065 bytes per milligram. And because I can't figure out how to use it as is its ONLY use to me is as a paperweight. ***

This is a pretty nice NAS unit with RAID functionality, Gbit ethernet and built-in USB 3.0 ports. I currently use it as a media server and it's working well. I have it configured to use Netgear's Flex-RAID option which allows you to select from 3 choices: RAID 0, RAID 1 or JBOD. The unit comes from the factory configured for X-RAID2 mode which allows easy drive upgrades while offering redundancy. Since I didn't need redundancy and because I needed all 2TB of capacity of both of the 1TB Seagate hard drives I chose RAID 0. With that said I also have a BUFFALO DriveStation Axis Velocity 2 TB USB 3.0 Desktop Hard Drive - HD-LX2.0TU3 plugged into one of the 2 USB 3.0 ports on the back. There is also a front USB 2.0 port that can be used for quick backups of the "backup" folder to an external device via a single button press on the front of the unit. Physically the unit is very small only about 6" H x 4" W 8" D and doesn't consume a lot of power about 25W max. It's also very quiet and doesn't get hot only warm..it does have a built-in cooling fan. The Dashboard web browser based interface is fairly easy to use and clean looking. This is where you check the status of the NAS like fan speed and temps. It's also where you make changes, additions, updates, configuration of the unit once it's up and running. I did my first firmware update through the dashboard and it went very smoothly. Here you could set the power saving feature. I have it set to sleep after 15 minutes of inactivity which spins down the two internal hardrives. I don't think it spins down external hard drives connected via the USB ports though I hope on the next firmware update Netgear adds this feature. The NAS itself could be completely shut down remotely from the dashboard or woken up via the WOL (Wake On LAN) feature using your own tool of choice. I think Netgear should have integrated a WOL function into the RAIDar app itself so that every time you run RAIDar it wakes up the ReadyNAS. Anyway I have tried remote shutdown and wake up and both are working on my system. For WOL I'm using a small freeware tool for PC called WAKE ON LAN EX V2.10. I also have NetAwake (free), iWOL Pro and iNet on my iPhone that is also able to wake up the NAS remotely AND wirelessly given that the NAS is connected to my Wifi router. WOL works best when the NAS is setup with a static IP address however some programs only need the mac address of the device you want to wake up. The NAS is able to be setup as a "cloud" storage device which could then be accessed from any device that's able to connect to the internet. So you could basically host your own websites which is very cool and saves you money on hosting fees as long as the cap on your ISP isn't too restrictive. This is better than having your whole PC on to host your files in my opinion. Netgear includes a software addon that installs onto the NAS called ReadyNAS Photos II. This addon allows the serving of photos over the internet to friends and family via your own cloud server. The Photos II's user interface looks very nice and is easy to use..offering some standard features similar to some of the other online based photo hosting sites. I also discovered that Photos II works well with iPhone 4's Safari browser which was surprising as it seems that the Photos II GUI is Flash based? One thing I did not like about this unit is that it seems when copying files from an attached USB drive via the rear ports the NAS is not smart enough to transfer via the faster USB 3.0 port itself but instead is bottlenecked by using the Ethernet port? For example if I wanted to copy a large file from my external Buffalo hardrive which is directly connected to the USB 3.0 ports on the back of the NAS, instead of copying solely via the USB port the file is first read from the source drive by the initiating device which is an Ethernet connected PC in this case and then sent back to the destination NAS drive via Ethernet? It's very inefficient and it's most apparent when this NAS is connected to a wireless router/switch. In this specific scenario the copying speed of files from the connected USB drive to the internal NAS drive is VERY slow limited by the wireless speed instead of Ethernet let alone USB 3.0 port! Copying should be treated as a fast USB 3.0 5Gbps local operation just like the front USB port when doing the quick 1 button backup. With that said, the good news is that the Gbit Ethernet is very fast even though it's theoretically much slower than USB 3.0. I got about 50MB/s of copying speed via Gbit Ethernet. Other than that issue I'm fairly happy with the operation of this NAS for what I'm using it for but this is definitely not for the average person without any technical background. For those people I'd recommend a simpler and cheaper USB based NAS instead.

The only thing I would change is the fact that it doesn't turn itself back on after a power outage. Love it.